A motley crew of aspiring treasure hunters in India found their search for ancient riches unearthing only trouble when authorities arrested them for the unauthorized dig.
Police say that the strange caper began when Surasani Ravindra Reddy found himself deeply in debt due to poor investments.
Desperate to get back on solid financial footing, Reddy turned to a pair of individuals who claimed to have profound 'spiritual powers' for help in finding lost treasure.
In turn, the duo told the cash-strapped man that, by way of some kind of religious ritual, they had detected the presence of seven chambers containing ancient statues hidden in a hillside of a village.
Apparently convinced in the veracity of their vision, Reddy assembled a team and set about retrieving this treasure.
Alas, their quest came to an end when police arrested them for what appear to be charges involving an illegal treasure hunt and, presumably, excavating a hillside without any permission or permits.
The intervention came after the unorthodox expedition had already dug a three-hundred-foot tunnel into the hillside and, ostensibly, had yet to yield any riches.
One odd detail from the ill-advised treasure hunt is that the group enlisted a whopping 50 laborers to help with the dig and insisted that all of them show up to work that day with lemons in their pockets.
Unfortunately, the reason for that rather specific and strange request goes maddeningly unexplained by Indian media, leaving one to forever wonder how the lemons were supposed to help in a treasure hunt.
Source: The Hindu